Many parents have fond memories of their children hanging on to every word of
a bedtime story. They also remember the time when their youngsters began to
read independently and devour fairytales or adventure stories. It comes as a
disappointment, therefore, when children’s enthusiasm for reading drops off
sharply during adolescence. It is worrying too. Children who read for
pleasure do better at school than peers who rarely read, and they make more
progress in learning vocabulary, spelling and even maths. According to a
2013 study by the University College London’s Instit

Pupils with eating disorders should be allowed to eat their lunch away from the rest of the school, according to a leading headmistress.
It has been suggested that the perfectionist culture at some elite private schools is fuelling eating disorders, but Sarah Welch said independent schools gave better support to vulnerable children, shielding them from the competitiveness of state education.
There has been a focus in recent years on eating disorders among girls at highly academic schools, with heads increasingly concerned about the issue.
Dr Welch, who becomes chairman of the Independent Sc

Finland is lauded for its education standards but it is taking a stance on
handwriting that would infuriate purists in Britain: dropping lessons in
cursive — joined-up writing.
Schools in Finland are phasing out the lessons in favour of keyboard skills,
because its board of education believes these are more useful.
Joined-up writing became more difficult after Finns introduced new ways of
writing their letters 30 years ago.
Minna Harmanen, of Finland’s board of education, told The Guardian:
“Children don’t have time to become fast at cursive writing, so it’s not
useful

Teachers used to taking a red pen to children’s books are having their own work corrected by proofreaders to avoid embarrassing errors.
West London Free School has hired the readers to comb through reports written for each child at the end of the academic year. The change has delayed the reports, some of which were not sent to parents until this week.
Toby Young, the school’s founder and chief executive, said that spelling and grammar mistakes made by younger teachers were common because many had not been properly taught. Mr Young conceded that he had corrected some of the proofreaders’ work